


Atomic Cherry

by CamillaBird



Category: Fallout 3
Genre: Cussing, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/M, Tags Are Fun, They Have to Stop Hating Each Other First, lots of cussing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-08
Updated: 2016-04-12
Packaged: 2018-05-25 13:59:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6197764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CamillaBird/pseuds/CamillaBird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Wasteland is harsh, barren and unforgiving. It’s survival of the fittest; kill or be killed. Hale is a drifter, never stays in one place too long and knows how to survive. Rule # 1-look out for yourself and fuck the rest, right? Ain’t got time to help some green, bleeding-heart vault girl with no survival instinct and heap of daddy issues. But, dammit, sometimes you just don’t get a choice. That rock and a hard place is a bitch.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I know, I know. Late to the party, as usual. And...yeah, I write this at breaks and lunch at work so it's not heavily edited. Still hope you enjoy!

                Dust. It was everywhere, in everything. Every fuckin’ crevasse. It was in the whiskey, shimmering and taunting. Whiskey and dirt. Nothin’ better.

                Night had just crept in to town, just like the man sitting hunched-almost protectively-over a warm glass of amber. The man threw back the whiskey with a grunt and held two fingers in the air for more.

                Fingers closed around the drink; the man barely felt the chips in the glass from his weather-hardened hands. He raised the edge to his lips and felt a warm, unwelcome hand on his shoulder.

                A blade was thrust under the stranger’s neck faster than they could blink. The man looked up from his drink into a pair of wide bloodshot brown eyes.

                After nearly thirty years in the wastes, hardly anything took him by surprise. This did. The girl at the end of his blade couldn’t’ve been more than twenty with rounded apple cheeks, tanned skin free of scars or burns or scabs and full, healthy lips.

                And then he saw the suit and scoffed pulling the dagger from her throat. Fuckin’ vaultie. Never met one himself but he’d been told they were harmless as babes and, left alone, lasted about as long.

                The man turned back to his drink but he could feel the weight of the vaultie’s stare at his back.

                “Get lost, kid.” He finished off the whiskey in his hand, neck crawling under the unwavering gaze of her brown eyes.

                “Um…but I,” Her voice was raw from crying. The man knew the sound well.

                He shook his head, motioning for another drink. Hell, just bring the damn bottle. “Don’t care. Beat it.”

                 “I want to hire you.”

                Bartender set another glass of weak piss in front of him. Knowing Moriarty, it probably _was_ piss. Long as it got him shit-faced drunk, he didn’t give a fuck.

                “I ain’t for sale, kid.”

                “But…Moriarty said…”

                The man sighed. Of course he fuckin’ did. Old, beat up, washed out, drunken son of a bitch. Probably listening in with that damn greasy smirk on his face.

                “Look, Vault-girl.” He leveled the girl with a steely glare. “I’m givin’ you a pass here cuz you’re young an’ stupid an’ your wasteland cherry ain’t been popped yet.” Liquid fire streamed down his throat as he took a long drink and slammed the glass on the metal bar top. “Take it. Find somebody else to bother before I gut that smooth little belly of yours and leave you for the molerats.”

                The girl’s pretty little face fell like a ton of bricks. Good. Get the hell outta here and leave me to my damn drinking.

                Many a greater man would’ve taken the fuckin’ hint and beat it. Not the vault girl. He’d barely felt the coolness of the glass touch his lips when he felt her slide onto the stool beside him and order a glass of ‘whatever he’s having’.

                Girl must have one hell of a death wish.

                The man continued to ignore her; ignore everything except the poison in his hands and the bag of caps on his belt. Thieves liked to hang around bars, watchin’ people drink themselves into blissful ignorance before they made off with their caps. Not him. Any man willin’ to try’s gonna walk away with one less hand than they walked in with.

                He heard a glass being set down and let out a humorless chuckle as the girl took her first sip and spat it out in a fit of coughing wheezes.

                “Never had whiskey, sweetheart?”

                The girl gagged, wiping her mouth with a blue cuff and glaring at him with all the force of an irritated kitten.   

                “Have too.” She argued. “That.” She pointed. “That is not whiskey. It tastes like metal.”

                The man tipped his glass to her. “Welcome to the Wasteland, sweetheart. Get used to it.”

                She frowned, staring into her glass as if it offended her. “Don’t call me that.”

                “What? Sweetheart?” He scoffed, finishing off his third drink and pushing away from the bar. Nervousness practically poured out of the girl as he towered over her; he watched her eyes  flicker to the shotgun mounted on his back  then to his belt where the dagger that’d been inches from her pretty neck hung.

                The man leaned in close; close enough to hear her breath hitch in fear and smell the hint of soap that still lingered behind her ears.

                “I’ll call you whatever the hell I want, sweetheart.” He whispered. His lips brushed against her earlobe and, hell, it felt good. “Out here ain’t like your precious vault. Don’t want me to call you sweetheart? Do something about it.”

                The girl was practically frozen beside him.

                “That’s what I thought.” He purred. “Word of advice, sweetheart, don’t shake shit up. Keep quiet and hope to hell the wasteland does a number on your looks. You’ll live longer.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

                Megaton was a shit-tank at night. It was a shit-tank during the day too but it was easier to forget without the irradiated glow of fucking nuclear bomb water to remind you.

                The man leaned against rusted railing, took a drag of his cigarette and watched Moriarty’s Saloon. People came in, people stumbled out. Not one of them wearing a blue jumpsuit with a giant fuckin’ yellow target on their back.

                Not sure why he cared. Maybe it was Moriarty’s piss or maybe all the damn Jet his neighbor was suckin’ down in the common room drifted his way. Girl was gonna get herself sold or killed-not his god damn problem either way.

                Still, the girl said ‘hire’ must be a desperate little thing. Protection in the wastes don’t come cheap and she ain’t been out long enough to have the kind of caps it’d take to-

                Ash fell from the man’s cigarette as he absent-mindedly patted his belt where his caps hung. Where they _should’ve_ fuckin’ hung.

                “Son of a-” He tossed the smoking stick down and threw open the door the commons. A couple of sleepers jumped awake and watched him wearily as he searched around the bed he’d been in. They weren’t there.

                That bag was on tight, he’d made sure. Double sure. Triple fuckin’ sure.

                And he’d had it in the bar, he’d-

                No. No way in hell. She didn’t. Couldn’t. Fuck.

                “Motherfuckin’ vaultie bitch.” He mumbled and stormed out and down the rickety walkway, fingers itchin’ for his shotgun.

                Bitch better hope to god that the goddamn bomb explodes before he got to her. That’d be a quick death.

                “Where the fuck is she?” The man stalked toward the ghoulish bartender and slammed his palms onto the bar.

                The ghoul’s eyes swiveled back and forth. “W-who?”

                “The vault whore,” He ground out.

                “I don’t-” And the ghoul found himself looking down the business end of a .44 revolver.

                The man’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “You got 5 seconds ghoul. 4. 3.” He pressed the cool tip of the barrel against ruined flesh and cocked the hammer. “2.”

                Those still sober enough to give a shit were watching him like he was putting on a show for their goddamn entertainment.

                “The young babe’s gone,” Moriarty said calmly, arms crossed and lookin’ like he’d just peeled his head off the fuckin’ desk. “Now how about ye lower yur gun, lad. Good help is hard to find these days.”

                Fuckin’ hell. The man lowered the gun with a curse. Nearly _three thousand_ goddamn caps gone. Three fuckin’ thousand. If he _ever_ saw that thieving little bitch again, he’d put so many holes in her that sun’d shine through.

                “What’s wit’ the long face eh, Hale?” Moriarty smirked. “Got an itch for the wee lass? I admit she’s quite the looker. All that smooth-”

                “Don’t fuck kids.” Hale grunted irritably. “That bitch stole somethin’ of mine and I want ‘em back.”

                The smarmy son of a bitch laughed. _Laughed._

                “A wee little girl got one over on the mighty Hale? An’ from a vault as well.” Moriarty chuckled. Hale’s fingers turned white around his gun. “Getting’ old? Soft? There’s a cream for that ya know; rub a bit on and it’ll get it right up- _fuck!”_

As the sound of gunfire and Moriarty’s whore’s screaming dimmed, anybody with any damn sense went back to drowning themselves in booze and self-regret. Martyrs didn’t live long in the wastes an’ Moriarty’s sorry ass wasn’t worth is weight in Brhamin shit.  

                Blood seeped through the bastard’s dirty fingers as he pressed them to his wounded shoulder. “Fuckin’ hell, boy! Have ye lost yer mind?”

The man shrugged. “Consider it payback for the fuckin’ swill you pass off as whiskey. You’ll live.” The ghoul behind the bar stepped protectively in front of Nova as Hale leveled the .45 at Moriarty’s head.

Moriarty glared daggers. “You’ll never make it outta the city, boy. Simms’ll git ye before ye get to the gates.”

A cold, crooked smile pulled at his lips. There was the crisp click of the hammer being pulled back.

                “Don’t ye want to know where the little lass went?” Moriarty tried with a pained, slimy grin. “Lower the gun, boy, you’ll get your little slut and I walk away.”

                Hale lowered the gun to his throat. “Keep talkin’.”

                “D.C. ruins. Lookin’ for her da, she is.” He said with a wince. “Sent her to GNR.”

                Shit. D.C. ruins were a warzone. Girl was probably already dead an’ rotting or a raider’s new playing. Either way…three thousand caps was a hell of a lot of money. He’d bled for that money, killed for that money. He _needed_ that money.

                Decision made, Hale lifted his eyes to Moriarty’s whose smirk made irritation creep up his neck.

                “Thanks.” He said, lifted the gun and pulled the trigger. No one made a sound as Moriarty slumped to the floor in a lifeless heap.

                Hale holstered his .45 and smirked coldly at the ghoul and the shaking red-head behind him before slipping out the front door as if nothin’ happened.

                No wonder the bitch needed a bodyguard, Hale thought as he made his way toward the city gates. D.C. ruins were ‘bout as bad as the wasteland gets-a hellhole wrapped in shit.

                _Lookin’ for her da, she is._

_Well, she ain’t gonna find him. ‘cuz if she ain’t dead by the time I get to her, she damn-well will be._


	2. Chapter 2

Cherry’s hands trembled; the 10mm pistol fell through her fingers onto the concrete though the sound was muffled by her ringing ears. All she’d ever shot was the BB gun her dad got her for her 10th birthday. It was never…like this.

                This hurt her palms, made them numb.

                _This_ …oh god, she was going to be sick.

                It shouldn’t have been so easy to turn away from the body but it was. That-that… _thing,_ used to be a person. She’d just killed someone.

                Sick, tangy and vile, rose in her throat and she collapsed to the cold floor of the Metro. Sobs tore from her throat as she heaved and coughed.

                _Such a scared, lost little girl._

Shut up. Shut up. _Shut up._

Cherry’s fingers curled around the concrete and rubble until they turned white. Her throat burned, her chest hurt and not just from the violent coughing and dry heaves.

                How could he?! How could he leave me all alone? He promised! Promised to protect me, love me, be there for me. I _had_ no one else.

                “You bastard.” She choked, not only on her words but on her tears. “Moriarty’s wrong. I’ll find you.”

                Cherry rolled over before she _fell_ over and just laid there, staring up into the darkness. This darkness, it seemed like it would never end. To her, it felt like weeks but, no, every morning at 6 a.m. on the dot, her wrist vibrated with the promise of a new day.

                A new day of wandering all alone in the darkness, wondering if that sound was something more than a Rad Roach. Wondering if today would be the day she got to feel warm sun on her skin again.

                Lost…she was lost. Lost in a maze of concrete and twisted artifacts of a time long past.

                No sense of direction, her dad used to say, just like your mother.

                Cherry wiped her mouth of the soft smile with her sleeve. He didn’t deserve her smile, not right now. It still hurt too much.

                “I have to find you.” She said softly to no one, to herself, to anyone willing to listen in this hellhole. “You’re all I’ve got.”

                Words hurt, burning in sync with her thighs from running from that…thi- _ghoul…_ and it was so dark and she was so tired.

                Cherry closed her eyes and saw her dad smiling back at her; eyes crinkled and happy…proud. Always proud.

                Would he be proud to see her now? Hair matted, dirty and smelling of stale sweat, dust and desperation-the person she’d just killed laying just feet away?

                She wanted to think so, she really, really did.

 

 

* * *

 

 

                Fuckin’ Metro. Fuckin’ ghouls. Fuckin’ vault girl.

                Hale’s grip on his combat knife tightened to the point his fingers started to throb. Soon as he found the bitch’s corpse-and he would-he was takin’ back his goddamn caps and leavin’ her body in this hellhole to rot.

                He walked with tense, even steps. God help anythin’ that popped out in front of him be it ghoul, human or fuckin’ mutant; they were gonna get gutted.

                Stab first, ask questions later. Stab hard enough and you don’t gotta bother with the fuckin’ questions.

                Hale kept close to the wall, following it with the edge of his boot to get some bearing in the darkness. It was less than quite. Rad Roaches shitting up the pipes, ghouls slobbering off in the distance, fuckin’ Raiders shootin’ off their guns for kicks, some girl crying…

                The fuck?

                Hale stopped to listen; it was definitely crying. Some girl got herself lost in the Metro? Ain’t possible…

                Unless the Raiders got themselves a girl and that wasn’t his damn business; too much headache for far too little reward, anyways.

                Get in, get his goddamn caps and get the fuck out. End of story.

                So, fuck it, he walked on but all he could hear were her soft, muffled sobs heightened by the darkness. Hale grit his teeth, flexing his fingers around the knife.

                Not my goddamn business.

                Not my fuckin’ problem.

                Damnit.

                Pushing away from the wall, his lifeline, Hale walked toward the sound slowly, testing for rubble or metal with the toe of his boot. Didn’t take long before the crying was so damn clear, he could hear the girl hiccup.

                Hale stepped around a corner and the crying stopped-immediately and with a soft gasp.

                He smirked in the darkness. “Can still hear ya breathin’.” Hale winced. Way to sound non-threatening.

                “Look,” He said irritably. “I ain’t gonna hurt ya.”

                “Bullshit.” The voice came from feet-level before there was a click and his eyes were assaulted with the first light he’d seen in a days.

                “Jesus fuckin’ Christ,” he muttered, his .45 aimed right at the vault girl’s dirty forehead in less than a second.

                This. This is what he fuckin’ gets for tryin’ to help somebody.

                “Don’t shoot!”

                Hale chuckled dryly, cocking the gun. “Not likely, sweetheart. You’ve got some shit that belongs to me an’ I want it back. Make you a deal, you hand over my caps and I don’t put a bullet in that pretty skull. Right?”

                 “Oh, well…um,” she tugged on the fraying sleeves of her jumpsuit, refusing to meet his eyes. “That’s not-or, well, that is to say-”

                “Spit it the fuck out.” He growled.

                “I don’t have them.” She said hurriedly.

                Hale paused a moment to process that, a dangerous glint to his eye. “The fuck you say?”

                The girl huffed, her bottom lip jutting out in a pout. Kid looked like shit with bloodshot eyes and unnaturally pale skin. Nothin’ like the sweet little whiskey-skinned thing he’d met in Megaton.

                “Moriarty’s an asshole.” She mumbled. “Somehow he knew that I…uh,”

                His lips formed an angry line. “Got a dangerous case of sticky fingers?” 

                “Knew that I took the caps.” She said with a hard tone. “Suddenly the 300 he wanted to tell me where my dad went became 2,000 and-”

                “ _2,000?!_ You gave that son of a bitch 2,000 of _my fucking caps?!”_

_“No!”_ Brown eyes widened in horror. “I-I snuck into his…erm, office, and hacked his computer.”

                His eyes narrowed further. “That paranoid fucker keeps the door locked when he ain’t in it.”

                The girl fiddled with her hands again. “I picked the lock.”

                Well, color him fuckin’ impressed. Girl had some skill after all. “Where. Are. My. Caps.”

                Vault girl nibbled on her lip. “I may have…spent some of it. Or most of it. On food and water and bullets and-”

                “You fuckin’ _spent it?!”_ She flinched. “Nearly 3,000 fuckin’ caps and you _goddamn well spent it?!”_

She threw up her hands. “Not all of it. There’s some left…about 500 I think.”

  1. 500 ain’t worth Brahmin shit. Not the right people.



                His finger itched to pull the trigger and give this bitch a brand-new hole. “This is what’s gonna happen,” He said coldly. “You’re gonna pay back every single cap you stole, startin’ with that 500. Every cap you get comes to me. Every fuckin’ one. Until then, I own you. You hear me?”

                “I’m not going to be your slave.” She snapped, her wide eyes narrowing slightly.

                Hale shrugged, gun still leveled at her head. “Always got a choice; either you pay me back my money or I shoot you. What’s it gonna be, sweetheart?”  
                Tears started to gather in her eyes; she drew her legs into her chest and wrapped her arms around herself.

                “I have to find my dad.”

                “Don’t care.”

                “Please.” Her voice was little more than a hoarse whisper as she looked down at her knees. “Please. I’ll pay you back everything just…I have to find him. Please.”

                “Fine.” He growled, lowering the .45. “Go find daddy but I ain’t leavin’ you to run off and get killed without payin’ me back. Until I have that last cap in my hand, you still belong to me. Got it?”

                Vault girl looked up, her eyes narrowed. “You’ll get your precious caps but I don’t _belong_ to you.”

                Hale holstered his gun with a shrug. “Don’t give a fuck what you think, sweetheart. Now get up,” he noticed the 10mm lying on the ground. “Pick up your gun and get a move on.”

                The girl came to her feet lookin’ like she’d fall over if a breeze blew her way.

                “My name,” she drew herself up to an impressive 5’1. “Is Cherry. Not sweetheart. Ch-er-ry. Like the berry.”

                Hale raised a brow with a scowl. “Cherry, huh? Figures.”

                She frowned, illuminated by the glow of that thing on her wrist. “What’s that mean?”

                He smirked without warmth. “Not a damn thing. Now let’s get a few things straight.” He stepped toward her, looking down into her splotchy face. “You run, I shoot you in the head. You try to shoot me an’ I shoot you in the head. You get caps, you hand ‘em right to me or-”

                “You shoot me in the head.” She finished dryly. The girl had balls. 

                The smirk grew to a chilling grin. “You got it, sweetheart.”


	3. Chapter 2

 

Home. Home was the smell of old grease, bacon and bleach; it was the flickering neon 101 sign above the diner’s jukebox and the acrid stench of medicine in daddy’s clinic. 

            Home was Amata and daddy and…hell, even Butch.

            This…place…would never be home. The very air stank of rust and rot, water was inedible, the food not much better. Even the sun had betrayed her, burning her cheeks and nose so badly she once thought she could smell herself cooking.

            And then…then there was _him._

            They’d been walking for hours in silence. Cherry nearly had to run to keep up with his long, hurried strides. The man was like a machine; never stopping, never slowing or showing weakness while she trailed behind him, thighs burning.

            _Why? Why did she just_ have _to take those caps?_ Well, because she never thought he’d care enough to track her down. Butch never did when she stole his baseball cards after he locked her in the supply room. Probably never even knew it was her.

            Cherry’d cried and banged on the door until someone found her and, even then, she was too scared of Butch to tell. She’d been nearly six and he was a big, scary eight and a half.

            She’d always been so small. Too small to fight back when one of the boys shoved her and too outspoken to avoid it altogether…so she took things. Little things. Things the boys wouldn’t really miss; things that could be misplaced. Should’ve thought about that before pushing a tiny, little girl into the wall and breaking her nose, boys.

            Cherry sighed, staring at the back of the man’s buzzed head. Old habits die hard, she supposed.

            Running had crossed her mind…not so much _running_ as disappearing. They were out of the Metro now; she could just…slip behind that concrete pillar up ahead and crawl underneath the rubble until he gave up.

            Then she eyed the grenades hanging from his belt and winced. Never mind…bad idea.

            “Could we stop?” She called then, seeing his muscles tense up added. “Please?”

            He stopped. Thank the heavens above, he stopped. Cherry doubled over with her hands resting on her knees, trying to catch her breath. She barely noticed the shadow cast over her before a gunshot deafened her ears and she cried out.

            He shot me! I’m dead. I’m dying. He’s killed me. Oh…no pain?

            Cherry looked up, right down the barrel of a shotgun. Her heart thumped in her throat, in her ringing ears and out of her chest.

            “Unnecessary.” She snapped. The man simply raised a brow then he shrugged, hoisting his shotgun over his shoulder.

            “Take a look behind you, sweetheart.” He said casually as if he couldn’t care less.

            Behind…what? Cherry craned her neck and suddenly scurried back away from the twitching pile of flesh.

            “Oh my god,” her back slammed into a concrete pillar. “What the hell is that thing? A-are those... hands? " Please don’t be hands. Cherry covered her nose with her sleeve.

            “Centaur. Been followin’ us a while,” He said. “Most of ‘em are ‘bout as dangerous as you-”

            “Also unnecessary.” She muttered under her breath before the man’s cold glare sealed her lips closed. It was the color; like the pictures she’d seen of glaciers rising up from the ocean, only his stare was like jagged spikes of ice.

            A sinister smile curled his lips. “Ain’t those you gotta worry ‘bout.” He lowered his voice to a dark, silky whisper. “See, Mutants keep these things ‘round like pets. An’ the master ain’t never far behind.”         

            Cherry swallowed her dry tongue, her eyes flickered to the dead heap of coarse hair, fat rolls and…hands….then back into the man’s ice stare.

            “Still wanna sit your ass down?”

            She shook her head, her thighs screamed as she took her first steps. Without another word the man turned his back and left her to catch up. Always catching up.

            “You know,” She said between hard breaths. “If you’d just agreed to be my guard-”

            The man gave a humorless laugh. “Take a lesson, sweetheart. My ass is always worth more.” He said. “Don’t take a bullet for nobody. An’ it takes a hell of a lot of caps for me to give a fuck whether you live or die an’ you didn’t have that kinda money, did ya?”

            Cherry glared a hole into his neck. “No, but I got some pretty quick after.”

            The man scowled at her over his shoulder. “Watch it, sweetheart.”

            “Or what?” She stopped, crossing her arms. “You’ll shoot me? I don’t think you will. Then how will you get your precious caps back?”

            The man realized she’d stopped walking and turned slowly. Seeing the harsh line of his jaw made her loose a bit of steam. Men didn’t look like him in the vault. No thick, corded muscles that could rip you to shreds; no ugly scars on their face.

            _What are ya, scared?_ Butch’s voice played in her head. _Scaredy-Cherry is scared again, why don’t ya go cry to daddy._

Cherry straightened her back, forcing herself to keep eye contact. Meet the viper’s gaze, as it were. Scaredy-Charry was dead; she died the day she left the vault. She wouldn’t be afraid of this man. She wouldn’t.

            “Maybe I ain’t gonna shoot you.” His voice was like liquid metal, soft and dangerous. “Maybe I’ll just hand you over to the slavers.” She watched his eyes sweep over her slowly. “Pretty one’s fetch a high price…” Then he smirked. “Guess, for you, I might _just_ break even.”

            “I-” Slavers…. _break even?!_ “You…you’re horrible!”

            The man shrugged and turned. “Comin’?”

            Cherry deflated. He had that effect on her; shrugging her off, belittling her anger. After all, what choice did she have but to follow the foul son of a bitch?

            “This D.C.?” she said after following quietly for a long while.

            “Yep.”

            She frowned. “Thought there’d be…more.”

            Concrete mountains far as the eye could see that smelled of dust and rotting wood; a child’s sock hung tattered and soiled from one of the broken railings.

            “Wonder what it looked like before?” She said softly to herself. “Bet there were trees and parks and grass. There was a picture book in the vault that had a big, green park with this little pond and these things called ‘frogs’. Like tiny, green blobs that hopped and-”

            “Don’t care.” The man snapped. “Shut the fuck up.”

            Cherry huffed. “One of us has to be civil. I don’t even know your name.”

            “Don’t need to.”

            “Fine,” She shrugged like he oh-so loved to do. “I’ll just call you jackass then.”

            “Ain’t no skin of my back what the fuck you call me, sweetheart.”

            Jackass, it is.

            And then, suddenly, his back was very close and she stumbled over herself to stop before she slammed into him.

            “What’s-”

            The man spun, shotgun in one hand and slapped the over her open mouth. Her tongue touched his palm leaving a lingering taste of salty sweat, dirt and Lord only knows what else in her mouth.

             Mouth wash. Surely this horrid place had mouth wash. Please God, let it be so.

            Cherry struggled but he only pressed tighter and glowered at her, motioning with his eyes to the concrete platform above them.

            Realization doused her fight in fear and she fell still. She hugged her 10mm close to her chest, vivid memories of the Metro make her finger tremble dangerously near the trigger.

            Her mouth had gone bone-dry; she welcomed the salty taste of the man’s skin just as a reminder that she wasn’t completely numb.

            The man leaned in; Cherry felt his hot, calm breaths on her ear as he silently pushed them closer to the concrete wall.

            “Don’t move a fuckin’ muscle.”

            A non-issue, she thought. Slowly, his peeled his hand from her mouth and secured it around his shotgun.

            Cherry squeaked quietly as he pulled away from her, inching down the ruined concrete wall. She panicked, grasping his bicep in a death grip, feeling his tight muscles tense even more.

            The man looked at her hand with narrowed eyes, his lips parted then in a split-second he shoved her into the wall. Hard.

            Cherry gasped and coughed, trying to catch her breath. Suddenly, her shoulder was on fire; she wiggled her fingers and choked on a sob. This is it. He really was going to kill-

            Suddenly she was yanked away and hurled to the ground behind the concrete slab. Tears teetering on the edge of her eyes fell hard as she collapsed onto her hands and knees.

            Oh, God…hurts…hurts so bad.

            Fire, white-hot fire pulsed in her shoulder; made everything else around her dull. The concrete jungle faded to darkness, the man trying to kill her no longer really mattered. Every breath hurt; she took short, fast breaths even as the ground started to get…odd. Fuzzy…sleepy...feel…

Weird…

 

 

* * *

 

 

Concrete exploded in a puff of dust by his head under a hail of bullets. Hale cradled his shotgun to his chest with his head cocked toward the glassless window to his left.

Follow the bitch to D.C.; it’ll be a great fuckin’ idea. Fuckin’ stroll in the park. Easy as motherfuckin’ cherry pie.

Fuck me. _Fuck, fuck,_ fuck _me._

Not one but _two_ motherfuckin’ lumbering sacks of meat. Muties. And he hadn’t seen Mr. Fuckin’ Sly Boy behind the crumbling brick wall until it was goddamn-near too late. Couple of inches and he’d never have gotten his fuckin’ caps back.

Hale’d blasted a hole through the fucker’s guts before it could reload.

But, shit, least that one didn’t have a _goddamn machine gun_.

Hale ducked as another stream of bullets exploded over his head. “Son of a bitch!”

Good goddamn thing these fuckers were ‘bout as smart as a fistful of nails. Sit tight, wait out the ammo an’ hope to _fuck_ his ancestors built good goddamn walls.

History was not on his side, here.

Minutes passed and the fucker finally stopped firing. Coulda run outta bullets, coulda thought he was dead. Didn’t matter. Motherfucker was getting’ a belly full of lead.

In one swift motion Hale swung himself up and out the window, shotgun barrel shining right at the Mutie’s chest.

One.

            A shell flew out as he pumped the gun. Blood sprayed from the hole in the fucker’s chest; hell, he could see the goddamn wall through it. Hale advanced half-crouched and slowly, watching the Mutie collapse around a graveyard of empty brass. He aimed the gun its head and pulled the trigger.

            What’d’ya know. They’ve got brains. He swung his shotgun over his shoulder, got himself behind cover and started toward where he left the girl. 

            “Alright sweetheart, break’s over. Get up and- _goddamn it.”_

The girl was _exactly_ where he’d left her; sprawled an’ passed out with blood soakin’ through her pretty 101 patch. Hale nudged her with his boot. Nothin’, not even a goddamn twitch.

            “Fuck…you dead?” He fell into a crouch beside her and pressed two fingers to her throat. Not dead. Just a pussy.

            He sighed. “Kid, you’re more fuckin’ trouble than you’re worth.”

            Hale reached down, wrapped his arms around her tiny waist and hoisted her limp body onto his shoulder. She mewled softly.

            “Shut it.” He adjusted her higher on his shoulder and hooked his arm around her thighs. Deeper into the ruins he went, sticking close to the walls until he found a decent place to drop the kid.

            Damn near the middle of the complex, he found the office of the luckiest son of a bitch in the world; four walls still fuckin’ standin’.

            Brittle carpet that smelled like the ass-end of a mole rat crunched under his boots; there were empty whiskey bottles, Jet, cans and cigarette butts all over the goddamn place. Hale knocked the shit off the desk with his arm and laid the fuckin’ kid down on top.

            She groaned and lolled her head to the side.

            “Gonna get a lot worse, sweetheart.” Hale kicked the empty bottles, searching through the junk with his boot. Couple of bottles still had some whiskey in ‘em. Few swigs.

            The vault suit was like a goddamn puzzle; buttons, zippers and motherfucking clasps.

            “Fuck this,” Hale drew his knife and sliced the fabric from collar to navel and shrugged it off her shoulders. Her white undershirt was stained yellow and red with her blood and sweat. He hooked his thumbs under the hem, grazing her soft belly and pulled it up.

            The kid whined in pain as he tugged it over her wounded shoulder and tossed it aside.

            “Kid,” he hissed through gritted teeth as he sliced the arm of her vault suit into strips. “You fuckin’ owe me. I ain’t a goddamn doctor.”

            Hale wiped the blood away best he could; the kid’s goddamn hair kept winding ‘round his fingers an’ gettin’ in his way. He was startin’ to get pissed.

            “An’ you owe me a goddamn drink too,” He twisted the cap off a leftover whiskey bottle and poured it over the wound.

            Her body twitched violently but her comfort wasn’t his problem. All he gave a fuck about was keepin’ the wound clean cuz a corpse don’t pay debts.

            “Congrats, sweetheart.” He said lowly as he wound the strips of her suit around her shoulder. “Your wasteland cherry’s just been popped.”

            Hale sniffed what little whiskey was left in the bottle then tossed it away in disgust. His standards for whiskey were fuckin’ low but they ain’t _that_ low. Not yet.

            But wait ‘till the kid wakes up, that’ll change.

            Why couldn’t shit just be easy? Sure, he wasn’t a righteous man…wasn’t even a good man but, Christ, first Sarah and now he’s stuck babysitting a goddamn kid.

            There was a chair in the corner by a row of file cabinets, he fell into; didn’t give a shit if it was comfortable, didn’t even give a fuck that it was covered in mold and bug shit.

            Girl ani’t been nothin’ but trouble since I met her, Hale leaned back into the chair and stretched his legs out wide. Well that’s just gonna have to change.

            Kid’s in for one hell of a rude awakening.


End file.
